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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsThe West's Infernos Are Melting Our Sense of How Fire Works
https://www.wired.com/story/west-coast-california-wildfire-infernos/?utm_source=pocket-newtab(This is from last Sept. but I didn't find a post about it. Thought it worth sharing.)
On the windy, hot day of July 26, 2018, as record 113-degree temperatures baked Redding, California, in the northern Sacramento Valley, Eric Knapp toiled in an air-conditioned government office. After work, he planned to meet his wife and 3-year-old daughter, and some family friends, for dinner. Slender and fair-skinned with a gentle smile, Knapp is a research ecologist for the US Forest Service. He was well aware that, three days earlier, in coastal mountains west of town, a wildfire had started when a trailer got a flat tire and the metal wheel rim scraped the asphalt, sending sparks into dry brush.
Like the vast majority of wildfires, this one, called the Carr Fire, burned initially as a wide but shallow band of flames advancing slowly, like a battalion of infantrymen marching shoulder to shoulder, and left behind charred grass and lightly scorched trees. The Carr Fire was also typical in that it moved according to the dictates of wind, ground slope, and flammable fuelssoutheast around a lake, then up a hill, in part because heat rises. Early on that particular morning, the fire had crested a rise above Redding and, with a northwesterly breeze at its back, crawled downhill toward town.
Knapp was finishing up for the day when his friend Talitha Derksen, a wildlife biologist with a daughter close in age to Knapps own, sent a text saying that her neighborhood might have to be evacuated. One of the agencies tasked with that judgment call, the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protectionaka CalFireis one of the worlds largest and most effective wildland firefighting organizations. CalFire bases evacuation recommendations on predictions of where, and how quickly, a flame front will move next. That day, the fire appeared likely to reach the floor of the Sacramento Valley at a subdivision called Land Park, about a mile northwest of Derksens house.
Knapp and the others changed plans: Theyd meet at Derksens, order pizza, and help her get ready to leave in case it came to that. Knapp stopped at his house to grab fireproof Nomex clothing. As he headed to Derksens, he considered dropping by the office again to pick up his hard hat and emergency fire sheltera sort of fire-resistant pup tentbut decided he was unlikely to need them.
Snip... That is the first 4 paragraphs, See link above for the rest.
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The West's Infernos Are Melting Our Sense of How Fire Works (Original Post)
AnotherDreamWeaver
Mar 2021
OP
burrowowl
(17,636 posts)1. Good read
quaint
(2,560 posts)2. Scary read.